Expertise cap as prot

Hi guys and girls and others unsure

I am a prot warrior currently slowly making my way through current content i feel quite good in my role and can do it quite well my question is why is mr robot and a lot of other posts recently saying prot should be aiming for the 15% expertise hard cap? In my current position other than increasing damage and decreasing survivabilitly i see no advantage as a tank any help would be appreciated.

cheers

---------- Post added 2013-01-22 at 01:55 AM ----------

oh any if anyone wants to see me im here eu.battle.net/wow/en/character/ghostlands/Steeledlee/simple

More exp=less parries=more rage=easier time having shield block active as often as possible AND bein able to use shield barrier on top of it.
so u mostly increase surviabilty.
but of course you shouldnt sacrifice too much other stats.

Have personally tried alot of different things, And im quite sure it can change depending on bossfight youre progressing on. Regardless - My baseline is 7.5/15% - Its just so smooth, and considering how much damage you do as a tank nowadays, its even more perfect .

If nothing else, go full offensive stats, even at the cost of mastery.

There's different optimizations. The more widely used is Hit/Exp > All, even though it decreases your survivability.
Why?
1) You'll have less damage spikes. Your rage generation will be constant and reliable. You won't have three SS parried in a row, leaving you with no rage during 15s against WotE.
2) You'll increase your damages. If you can't survive an encounter, your seconde role as a tank is to deal substantial damages.
3) This optimization works whatever you're fighting. Others optimization are better to reduce incoming damages on most fights but may require reforges for some fights (like Lei Shi.)

There's different optimizations. The more widely used is Hit/Exp > All, even though it decreases your survivability.
Why?
1) You'll have less damage spikes. Your rage generation will be constant and reliable. You won't have three SS parried in a row, leaving you with no rage during 15s against WotE.
2) You'll increase your damages. If you can't survive an encounter, your seconde role as a tank is to deal substantial damages.
3) This optimization works whatever you're fighting. Others optimization are better to reduce incoming damages on most fights but may require reforges for some fights (like Lei Shi.)

Hmm, i'm going for 15% Expertise AND Hit. Is that bad? I'm loving having complete control over my rage, but would the 7.5% of hit be better placed in Mastery?

As a protection warrior, one of your jobs is to keep Weakened Blows up on the target. Thunderclap cannot be dodged or parried, but can miss. 7.5% hit is your first priority. 15% expertise is right up behind that.

He meant TDR (total damage reduction), which doesn't always mean a ''survivability increase''.
Mastery/Parry/Dodge provide more TDR than the Rage generation from Hit/Exp (unless for some reason you're spamming Shield Barrier). Sims and spreadsheets show this.

Does that mean Mastery/Parry/Dodge also increase ''survivability'' when compared to Hit/Exp ? Not necessarily. The answer to that is a tad more complicated, ; )
Right now on T14 however, it isn't the case most of the time, as the opposite is. This is why we prioritize Hit/Exp over Mastery and Avoidance.

That was my point, the offensive stats increase survivability over TDR because of their direct correlation to spike reduction (having enough rage to keep damage intake steady). I questioned him precisely because I felt he needed to clarify the statement better.

Currently I'm going the mastery-way of reforging and gemming. Would it make sense to go (for example) for the 7.5 % hit but only 12 % expertise?
I could go to 15 % expertise but I would lose a lot of mastery.
Or is it a "all or nothing"-strategy (7.5 % expertise OR 15 % expertise)? Beside all the other factors that come into play when gearing a tank: Reaction time of your healers, encounter et cetera.

Currently I'm going the mastery-way of reforging and gemming. Would it make sense to go (for example) for the 7.5 % hit but only 12 % expertise?
I could go to 15 % expertise but I would lose a lot of mastery.
Or is it a "all or nothing"-strategy (7.5 % expertise OR 15 % expertise)? Beside all the other factors that come into play when gearing a tank: Reaction time of your healers, encounter et cetera.

Every bit of expertise helps! It's not like in the past where the first 7.5% double dipped now the first 7.5% is to take dodge off the roll table. Thus this is why many say that 7.5% is the soft cap because once you hit 7.5% exp the boss can no longer dodge your attacks. Every point after that up untill 15% is taking away a chance that the boss can parry your attack. So having 12% is beter than 7.5% but not as good as 15% but 12% is not uelsess!

Mastery for wars is really nice but I must ask what will you be doing with that mastery when you hit SS from a S&B proc and its parried and you need to wait to build up more rage to get S.block up? This is how I always viewed hit exp since MOP came out :Once capped they allow me to use my mastery in a smooth and predictable manner where I will take full advantage of the crit block benefit. Before being capped I leave myself open to the RNG gods where I may get slapped and not benefit fully from my points in matery where the points in Hit EXP are always usefull (barring off tanking and hitting the boss from behind... but then points in mastery are useless at that point as well!).

As L Kebess said, I was talking about TDR.
But yeah, I know that TDR is not the most important thing a tank, since it won't help healers to keep you alive if you take less damages but more spiky.
But, still, it's important to know than Hit/Exp is not the best stats as far as TDR is concerned (it's even the worst, IIRC).

Every bit of expertise helps! It's not like in the past where the first 7.5% double dipped now the first 7.5% is to take dodge off the roll table. Thus this is why many say that 7.5% is the soft cap because once you hit 7.5% exp the boss can no longer dodge your attacks. Every point after that up untill 15% is taking away a chance that the boss can parry your attack. So having 12% is beter than 7.5% but not as good as 15% but 12% is not uelsess!

Mastery for wars is really nice but I must ask what will you be doing with that mastery when you hit SS from a S&B proc and its parried and you need to wait to build up more rage to get S.block up? This is how I always viewed hit exp since MOP came out :Once capped they allow me to use my mastery in a smooth and predictable manner where I will take full advantage of the crit block benefit. Before being capped I leave myself open to the RNG gods where I may get slapped and not benefit fully from my points in matery where the points in Hit EXP are always usefull (barring off tanking and hitting the boss from behind... but then points in mastery are useless at that point as well!).

PS: Nice youtube vids!

Yeah, I know the MoP-expertise-mechanic. And you've got a good point, that only with a smooth rage-gain our mastery can shine. And it is damn frustrating when a S&B-proc gets parried or dodged. On the other hand it's just ridiculous how much mastery reduces the dmg-inc on encounters like Will, Gara'jal or any other melee-hardhitter.
I think, I have to test it out. I'll go next raid with exp-cap and less mastery. See how it plays out. Thanks for the inupt bobyboucher and thanks for the kudos@myyoutubechannel, appreciate it

Currently I'm going the mastery-way of reforging and gemming. Would it make sense to go (for example) for the 7.5 % hit but only 12 % expertise?
I could go to 15 % expertise but I would lose a lot of mastery.
Or is it a "all or nothing"-strategy (7.5 % expertise OR 15 % expertise)? Beside all the other factors that come into play when gearing a tank: Reaction time of your healers, encounter et cetera.

Yes going for 12% is fine if you feel that you don't want to loose too much mastery. Going from 7.5% to 3% parry chance is quite a good reduction and should make a parry streak even more unlikely - It's all up to personal preference.

As promised here's a small experience-report (I used to have full mastery setup and now trying hit/exp-setup).
Today I reforged my gear to the following stats (or check my char in the signature):
hit: 7,4 %
exp: 14,33 %
mastery: 8,1k
We did a quick terrace normal clear and then went to HoF. Killing Blade'Lord on Heroic and progressing on Wind'Lord HC (which is our 6th heroic-boss).
For me it was great. Having a better and more reliable threat and rage-generation was fantastic. Also the feedback from my healers was good. It felt good to have the full control about your AM.
I think I'll stay with this reforging for our future heroic-progress. Only boss I could imagine that full mastery-gear would be better is WotE heroic. Due to the long "dance-session" it wouldn't be a problem if 1 or 2 of your revenges and shieldslams geht parried/dodged.

Yes going for 12% is fine if you feel that you don't want to loose too much mastery. Going from 7.5% to 3% parry chance is quite a good reduction and should make a parry streak even more unlikely - It's all up to personal preference.

The amount of block/crit block lost going from 12-15% mastery is negligible in this tier.